While players had a field day hitting long balls out of the Clayton South field with its own version of the Green Monster, it won't be like that today as the 2013 Cal Ripken 12/60 Middle Atlantic Regional Tournament gets underway.

"There's going to be some tremendous pitching this weekend," said tournament director Scott Shaffer, who along with numerous other individuals helped put the pieces together for the regional event that includes eight teams from Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Jersey and New York. "It's going to be an exciting tournament."

Emmitsburg's Brett Weatherly highlighted the night by winning the home run derby with eight long balls in the final round. Weatherly outslugged Northern New Jersey's Joshua Rosado and Wyalusing's Luke Shultz to win the competition.

Medford (N.J.) won the Around the Horn throwing competition and Wyalusing won the baserunning competition that is run similar to a relay race with four runners from each team taking turns running the bases.

Teams came to southcentral Pennsylvania from as far away as West Elmira and the Bronx and as close as Emmitsburg, Md. just 16 miles to the east. In fact, host Waynesboro takes on Emmitsburg at 1:30 p.m. today in the first game of pool play for the two teams. The two New York teams, Kingsbridge (Metro New York) and West Elmira (Western New York), open the tournament with a 1 p.m. game on the Clayton North field.

"It's been a hectic couple of days," said Waynesboro manager Troy Witte. "We're ready to play."

Players from each team were introduced by public address announcer Ben Dennis, who also interjected music from a personalized song list throughout the evening's festivities.

Curtis Mummert of Buchanan Auto Park threw out the first pitch, and players, coaches and spectators honored America with the playing of the national anthem by staring up at a giant American flag hoisted on a Grove crane in the stone parking lot adjacent to the Clayton South field.

After a brief introduction of players followed by the throwing of the first pitch and the playing of the Star Spangled Banner, the skills competition took place.

Perry County set the early standard in the baserunning competition with a time of 49.84 seconds. West Elmira came close, finishing in 49.86 seconds. Wyalusing, one of the last teams to run the bases, won with a time of 49.31 with runners Will Kiner, Jacob Doyle, Brian Lewis and Luke Shultz representing their team in the event.

Then, it was Medford's turn to shine in the Around the Horn throwing event. Starting with a toss from the pitcher to the catcher, players at each position took turns throwing the ball with the throw from second base to home plate completing the competition. Timmy Schmidlin, Daniel Frake, Timmy Heslin, Sal Cusumano, J.C. Dobis, Dom Forte, John Capone, Jack Cobb and Luke Mather all earned medals for winning the event.

Page 2 of 2 - The night culminated in the Home Run Derby with plenty of baseballs landing over tall trees and into neighboring backyards. So many children were chasing the balls that an announcement was made prohibiting children from running into yards and retrieving balls.

Two players from each team competed. The top eight after the first round, during which hitters received 10 outs, advanced to the second round. Rosado and Waynesboro's Cole Reed each had seven home runs after the first round. West Elmira's Ben Cook had six, followed by Luke Shultz of Wyalusing, Harry Vargas of Kingsbridge and Tobiah Walizer of Waynesboro with five and Weatherly and Luke Newman of Medford with four.

Shultz had the hot bat in the second round as he launched eight homers as each player got eight outs. He, along with Rosado and Weatherly — who each hit five — made it to the third and final round. It was all Weatherly, who smashed eight homers in the five-out round. Rosado had three and Shultz had two.